[History of the Red Army pathoanatomical service in World War II 1941-1945]

History of the rise of the pathology service in the system of the military-medical service of the Red Army is described and the arguments in favour of its necessity in the fighting troops are presented. The characterization of the goals of such a service is given, notably: an evaluation of the work of the military-medical establishments on the basis of a summarized clinico-anatomical analysis of pathology data, this allowing the heads of the military-medical service a rapid elimination of organizational and therapeutic-diagnostic defects of various stages of medical evacuation and improvement of the activity of the therapeutic evacuation centres; establishing the causes of death of the persons wounded or struck in the battles and evaluating the significance of the type, time, volume and shortcomings of the treatment in the fatal issue; studying the pathology of the war trauma, regeneration, the pathogenesis of infectious complications and influence on their development and course of the treatment, etc. The organizational structure of the service, its branches (front and army laboratories of pathology, department of pathology of big hospitals) working under the guidance of the Central Laboratory of Pathology (CLP), is described. The documents which were the basis of the work of these laboratories are characterized. An important merit of M.F. Glazunov and N. A. Krayevsky--chiefs of the CLP--in the organization and guidance, both practical and scientific, is noted. The main results of the activity of the service are briefly characterized.